Teleconferencing has long been an essential tool for communication in business and other areas. One type of teleconferencing system is a video conferencing system, which transmits real-time video as well as live audio between participants of the conference. The video conferencing system typically has a video processing portion and an audio processing portion. The video processing portion includes a camera to capture real-time video of the participants and a video display for showing real-time images of the remote participants. The audio portion includes one or more microphones to pick up voice signals of the participants and includes loudspeakers to reproduce voices of the remote participants.
Frequently, it is desirable to use more than one microphone during a conference. For example, a single microphone will have difficulty picking up voices from participants sitting far away from the microphone. Therefore, a number of microphones are typically used. In addition, it is often desirable to conduct conferences in stereo because stereo reproduces the spatial relationship between various sound sources, making speech from different participants more distinguishable and intelligible to remote viewers. To meet the needs of conducting a video conference in stereo with multiple microphones, it is known in the art to build customized rooms for video conferences. In a customized room, a number of microphones are typically mounted in fixed locations relative to a display and a camera, and the conferencing equipment and microphones are configured for the best arrangement for conducting audio in the room.
However, not all video conferences are conducted in customized rooms. More often, video conferencing equipment is mobile and is moved between rooms depending on the needs of the users, or the video conferencing equipment is not specifically customized for the room. Therefore, there is no fixed arrangement of microphones, display, camera, etc. for best reproducing audio information. Consequently, a number of problems may occur when multiple microphones are used in a video conference and there is no fixed arrangement for best reproducing the audio. For example, signals from microphones where no one is speaking may be substantially noise. If all signals from all microphones are mixed together, a large number of noise signals are mixed with voice signals, reducing the signal to noise ratio, while still providing a known spatial relationship between the microphones.
Therefore, it would be beneficial for a video conferencing system to be capable of mono and stereo audio operation and to be adaptable to changed locations and various arrangements depending on the needs of a user. The subject matter of the present disclosure is directed to overcoming, or at least reducing the effects of, one or more of the problems set forth above.